Brother To Brother
by One Wish Magic
Summary: "It takes two men to make one brother." Because there isn't enough emphasis upon the brotherly relationship of Kurt and Finn. Brothers will always be there to interfere and offer advice, even when the action is unlooked for. It was a difficult road, which needed the two boys to become men to make it work. But in the end, the struggle was worth it, would always be.


_Well, here's an example of lax typing. I wrote this over the Christmas period and am only now getting round to posting it.  
This takes place around 3x06  
Mostly just a little exploration of Kurt and Finn's brotherhood, which we do not see enough of! And thier trepidation of having everything change, because we can never preserve a perfect moment in anything more than memory, and even that can be fleeting. Sorry, it's a bit rambling.  
_

_This was a quick typing out. I wanted to get it out there before I went away for a few days, and I couldn't take time out from typing my other story, so it had to be these few inbetween days or nothing :') That said, I don't hate it, I just want to look over it again when I get back. So until then, I leave it to you. Hope you can get some enjoyment out of it._

_The title is taken from the song of the same name by Gregg Allman. (I got it off a Supernatual video)_

_Disclaimer: I do not own Glee, rather it owns my life at the moment :')_

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**Brother To Brother**

* * *

Childhood is an intense period of desire and gratification. Most people will never remember the first thing they wanted with such fervency that it seemed the world would end should the request go unsatisfied. And those who would claim otherwise, list things such as; the then high fashion play-things, bicycles, gadgets or indeed, a puppy.

Growing up, the first thing that Finn ever remembered wanting was a brother … well, that and football legend Peyton Manning as a father – but the former was a far more realistic prospect.

A resident best friend, accomplice, conspirator and partner of youth. Someone who enjoyed football, music, gaming and singing as much as he did. For almost twelve years, he nurtured like a tender flame, that same ardent desire, until the wayward wants of adolescence seized him and drove from his mind all remnant wishes of a rational character.

Then, four years overdue in coming, when its meaning and value were all but obsolete, that so long kindled wish came to fruition, except … Kurt was nothing like the figure he had envisioned. Maybe they found identification on the grounds of singing, but even then, their styles were so different that it could hardly be called a common denominator. Belatedly, he realized that when he had imagined a brother beforehand, it had never been one with the free will and liberal individuality to make their own decisions, but rather as a willing aid to his every whim and inspiration. And wasn't Kurt rapidly teaching him the error of his oversight.

Kurt Hummel was a name and figure Finn had known all his life, but without familiarity.

In Kindergarten, he was the small, angelic faced child who preferred to play house with the girls, than to lend his vehicle to the imaginary grand-prix of the boys, and Finn thought he was weird.

In Elementary, he suffered tragedy, so far as a child could understand the concept of loss, and rumours abounded. He became quiet and withdrawn, and people shunned his presence, both shying away from his apparent grief and resenting his difference. Finn watched him with a mixture of pity and exasperation: why couldn't he just cease his effeminate actions and be like everybody else; be normal?

In Middle-school, he discovered the diversity of haute-couture, and opened up an entire new avenue of expression in his life, though his classmates were unappreciative and even scorning. Finn thought he looked ridiculous and was only seeking to direct more attention upon himself.

By High-school, he was an established outcast and the choice victim of the football teams dominant and brash crusade. He bore each subsequent incident with aloof resignation and a will to never be oppressed. And Finn felt sorry for him, seeking at least to curtail Puck's impulsive actions.

But then, something intervened.

Finn didn't steep much credit upon the philosophy of fate and destiny, abstract concepts as they were. You were born, you lived, you got old and you died. And he was a boy who had both gained and defected his religion in the same week. But it made sense, that if the situation defied understanding, as many things to him did, then the forces behind it must be as similarly incomprehensible, ie. Those of fate and destiny.

But the coincidences which had brought the two boys, whose lives had run adjoiningly since their inception but without ever meeting, together, and by extension that of their parents' – living half lives in lieu of the loss of a loved one – as a single whole, were astronomical. And they made Finn's head hurt to even attempt considering them.

A million chances of fate had bonded them, and heralded the opportunity for a second happiness, not frequently extended. And who decided nuclear families were so great anyway? In so many cases, they were bonded only by blood, while the Hummel-Hudson family were bonded by something considerably more substantial: love.

That was not to say things had been easy, quite the contrary actually (Finn could recall a particularly choice occasion, featuring a less than admirable and certainly obscure portion of his nature, whose exercise had culminated in his mother and Burt almost calling the whole thing off.) But it was those turbulent highs and lows which bonded them on the most profound and integral levels. And everything had been worth it in the end.

The calm serenity of the Hummel-Hudson household, along with the brooding silence of its previously sole occupant, suffered its accustomed periodic disruption at exactly 4:30pm, when the world-wind that was Finn in a thrilling ecstasy, made his triumphant return from football practice.

Slamming the door, throwing his gym bag haphazardly onto the sofa and kicking his shoes carelessly into the otherwise tidy corner, Finn made straight for the kitchen: a series of events as habitual as breathing.

Opening the fridge, he chugged down a good half pint of milk straight from the carton (choosing to ignore his mothers echoed protests, which were so ingrained into his mind that they sounded, independent of her presence) and grabbed two chocolate bars to tide him over until lunch … which he and Kurt would be making since their parents were out campaigning.

Or, then again, maybe just Kurt, unless the other had a sudden illogical desire for inedible food, or grilled cheese sandwiches.

Either way, he grabbed a third, forcing it into his mouth whole, before chewing like an animated blowfish. Savouring the sweet and creamy taste, he turned to survey the kitchen-diner at large, and startled slightly to realize that he was not alone. Swallowing thickly, he hastened to register his surprise:

"Whoa, dude! Didn't even see you there!"

He hastily wiped his mouth, suddenly preoccupied with any remnant smears of chocolate which may have took up residence there. Usually Kurt's vocal disgust at what he termed Finn's 'vulgar eating habits,' would have gave him away. But apparently not today.

Kurt didn't even look up from where he was positioned at the head of the dining table, sitting with unnatural stillness and staring almost unblinkingly at the dimly lit laptop screen, as if distantly enraptured. He was surrounded by three separate Shakespeare texts and a copious amount of balled up paper. His usually so casually coiffed hair was alarmingly disarrayed and tussled, as if he had run his fingers through it in frequent frustration, and a smudge of ink blemished his right cheek.

Tonight marked one of those rare occasions which found Kurt and Blaine separated due to the constrains of homework or engagement. Honestly, Finn was so accustomed to the former Warbler's presence in their home, that upon infrequent evenings such as this, it seemed more disconcerting that he _wasn't_ there. The guy had even somehow won a fifth seating at Friday night dinner, and that was not an honour Burt and Carole extended lightly.

He could bet Burt Hummel never expected to be breaking bread with the boy he had once found hung-over in his sons bed. Favourable first introduction that was not. It had taken Finn a week before he could look Blaine in the face with adequate composure after that.

"Er … Kurt?"

Still he gave no indication of having heard Finn, or even of realizing his presence in the room. He just continued to stare at the screen, his face a myriad of troubled emotions.

"Dude?" And now Finn was beginning to get worried, because Kurt was never usually so non-vocal for such a prolonged period of time. He took a seat opposite his brother, making an effort to speak calmly and softly as he had witnessed his mom do in portending crisis;

"What's going on?"

Still no response. So Finn fell to deduction.

One of the first ever things he had learned about his brother, much to his dismay, was that Kurt constituted the human equivalent of a Rubik cube. Six faces which were ideally cohesive, but in reality made for an unpredictable, varying, temperamental and often times, incomprehensible, nature of emotions, which conformed to no logical pattern of presentation. Half of what he said, he didn't mean, and he meant everything that he didn't say. Finn guessed that life had made him that way, guessed that Kurt preferred to remain an enigma, to all but his nearest and dearest, and sometimes, even to them.

But over time, Finn had learned to read him, to penetrate that indifferent and sarky exterior which was nothing more than a front, until Kurt became (to him) a real person; one who he could reach out to.

So when he looked upon those doleful eyes and porcelain features; twisted and warped into a deep set frown – he saw sadness, anger, betrayal and hurt, and he knew something was fundamentally wrong.

In the grips of apprehension, he called out, much louder than his previous efforts;

"Kurt!" And for good measure he brought his hands together in one swift, smooth and resounding stroke.

That single clap brought Kurt from his evidently disquieting reverie more effectively than anything prior. As soon as Kurt met his gaze, appearing momentarily surprised at the company – though the expression slid from his features as silk brushing against silk – Finn repeated his enquiry with concern;

"What's going on with you? Has something happened?"

His thoughts were wild and rampant enough that he dared not contextualize, and lend them further encouragement but voicing them aloud. He fretted for everything from the health and safety of their parents, to Kurt's well-being in school. And he was torn between the desire to shake his brother until he was afforded some answers, or else hug him, for his expression seemed so devastated.

"I can't believe she's done it again!" The words were both harsh and melancholy, as his hands balled into fists.

"Who's done what?" Now that he had gotten Kurt talking, he wasn't going to allow him to falter into silence again without winning some explanation.

"Our business is meant to be _private_, not the topic of gossip for twenty-thousand strangers! They have no idea what it was like to live through it, instead they just discuss it like some scandal, ready to believe the next portion of lies she dishes out to them …"

Okay, Finn officially had no idea what he was talking about. All he could do was sit and watch in strange amazement as Kurt's cheeks flushed alternately red and pallid with anger and indignation. He had never seen Kurt so affected by the actions of another before, and he had had his fair share of incidents.

"Slow down, would you? I still have no idea who or what you're talking about."

Kurt took a deep breath and groaned, as a man admitting his cardinal sin to an unsympathetic jury.

"I went to see Sue today."

"As in …?"

"As in Sue Sylvester, yeah." His tone was clipped, but Finn sensed his anger was more self inclined.

" … Why?"

What would possible possess a person to willingly inflict her presence upon themselves, was beyond his comprehension.

"Because I'm an idiot. Because I'm a glutton for punishment. Because I wanted her to stop tearing down dad's campaign with ridiculous arguments. Take your pick."

He enunciated each syllable like he was berating himself. Like he was forced to relate his folly to one of little understanding, knowing the admonishment simply admitting them earned him.

Finn was seized by sympathy. He knew Kurt was well able to look after himself, hell, he had seen him in action and that was something to observe, but sometimes, like now, when he appeared so misguided and lost, Finn felt the brotherly need to protect him, and from the harshest critic of all; himself.

Kurt sighed;

"I wanted her to realize that what she was doing was unfair, spiteful and wrong, and contravened the practises of good sportsmanship. I wanted her to play fair and stop with all the personal slights, and making jokes of things she'll never understand. I just wanted her to stop spreading poison and lies, which it seems the people of this state lap up like scavenging dogs. I guess I thought I could appeal to her infrequently exercised better nature or something. I don't know." And finally, it seemed, that his anger had burned out, because he just sounded defeated.

Finn honestly felt sorry for him. In trying to do good, Kurt had inadvertently stuck himself with his own spear, and the elder wondered desperately what he could do to put things right again.

"Did you know that 30% of the voting public actually believe dad has a baboons heart?" Kurt asked, looking at him with tired exasperation, and something akin to childlike innocence flowered in his eyes, making him seem to shrink before the world.

"What?" Finn both raised an eyebrow and scowled in a single gesture, torn between disbelief and outrage.

"How do you know that?"

Rather than confess the origin of the fact, Kurt simply continued to read aloud the various propaganda circulating about his father, and by extension, Carole, in a voice of equal parts scorn and distress.

Startled, Finn quickly got to his feet, almost toppling the recently vacated chair in his haste, before closing the distance between him and Kurt in two strides.

His hands resting upon the back of Kurt's chair, he gazed intently over his brothers shoulder at the laptop screen, and upon it, the currently open window. One glimpse told him all he needed to know.

"That's it."

In a single movement, he knocked Kurt's hands aside, and slammed the lid shut, before proceeding to disengage the charger a little more forcefully than was strictly necessary. Then, ignoring Kurt's protests, he deposited the expensive gadget unceremoniously atop the mounted kitchen cupboards. A location that Kurt could not reach under his own steam.

"Finn – what the hell?" Kurt demanded, advancing in outrage upon his brother, despite the fact that their height difference was significantly in Finn's favour.

"Do you think I'm just going to stand by and let you upset yourself by reading this crap? No way, dude!"

There was a tightness in Finn's chest, which could only be classified as the moderate pangs of horror and grief. The only response affordable to the revelation of some self-destructive tendency of a loved one.

Horror, because he didn't know for how long, or indeed, how often Kurt had sat in solitude, brooding over this garbage in vice. And grief, because it physically pained him to see how much the unsleeping and erroneous speculation of strangers wounded Kurt, and because, in his heart, Finn knew that he should have realized something was amiss sooner. But not even he could second guess a secret Kurt strove to conceal.

Rather than lend his voice to attempts of justification when he had none to offer but compulsion, Kurt opted instead towards a new avenue of argument.

"Finn, give me my laptop back right now! I've got an English report to finish." It was said with force.

"Oh yeah? And how far have you got, huh? That is, I mean, between reading this crap. How far, huh? What, one line? Two?"

Finn had not realized he was shouting until Kurt recoiled slightly, as if stung. They gazed at each other for a long moment, gazing through the eyes of a stranger, echoes of a discordant memory once again coming to light. Finn breathed rapidly, endeavouring to dispel his anger, while Kurt simply stood motionless, his face the inscrutable mask he presented to the world when plagued with introspective insecurities.

It really is extraordinary to think how often oppositional emotions marry to commemorate the occurrence of a single event. In the epitome of happiness, we weep as if grief were our only companion. In the passion of love we share a carriage with jealousy; the furtive third party who lends doubt to the strength of our own conviction. In the vice and paralysis of fear, and the noble if misguided compulsion to protect those who we hold dear, even with our own lives, we turn to the hold of anger and admonishment – even when our true want is nothing but to hold them close and whisper in comfort that everything will be okay. The very action that we cannot bring ourselves to perform.

After a few minutes, Finn regretted raising his voice, because all it ever succeeded in doing was pushing Kurt further away. Placing his hand upon Kurt's shoulders and only holding tighter when Kurt attempted to shrug him off, he strove to make amends, because, despite reprisal, Kurt had chosen to confide in him, and Finn knew well enough to covet that trust.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to yell at you, it just sorta came out. Can't you do it tomorrow, instead?" he pleaded as of yet, unwilling to restore his internet privileges.

Kurt sighed heavily, and Finn felt his shoulders slump under the burden of the assignment, and his own self directed frustration. He had failed to notice before just how worn out and strained Kurt looked, an image reminiscent of his own visage after too much football and too little sleep.

"It's due _in_ tomorrow." Kurt massaged his temples as if warding off a headache.

Finn shrugged, still not seeing the problem. This was exactly why he had given up homework, life was hard enough without having something else to remember.

"Do it tomorrow," he repeated. "Honestly, Kurt, you're exhausted. You're trying to juggle school work, play rehearsals, overseeing Burt's campaign and running your own. It's too much for one person to do alone."

Kurt shrugged free of Finn's hold before sidling back over to the dining table and reclaiming his seat, shuffling various papers into a contrite pile before saying, with feigned conviction;

"I'm fine.

For anybody who knew him less well that his brother, those bold syllables would have effectively absolved all doubt, but Finn was too well accustomed to his techniques to yield without argument. He could literally _see_ the dark circles beneath Kurt's eyes, prominent as purple bruise-like shadows against his porcelain skin, where the meretriciously applied concealer had worn away and smudged during the day. And the fact that Kurt had failed to notice and rectify this travesty was more evidential to his exhaustion than the physicality itself.

"Kurt …"

"_Okay_, geesh," he relented putting his head in his hands as he admitted it, "so maybe I'm a little tired."

Finn snorted, sure, and the ocean was a little wet. He took the seat opposite again, their argument disregarded. Brotherhood was the representative identity of best friend, come worst enemy, contained within the physical shell of a single being.

"Dude, if you were a car, we'd be calling roadside recovery for you, and getting the bus home."

"Oh, thanks, Finn." Kurt rolled his eyes.

Unwrapping his second chocolate bar, Finn broke it in half with a satisfying snap, before offering the latter to Kurt, who thanked him with a wordless smile. They savoured in comfortable silence. Finn forcing each subsequent chunk into his mouth even before he had properly finished breaking down its predecessor, while Kurt melted each one individually on his tongue. And somewhere between the intense taste of chocolate and caramel, all their negative emotions faded, momentarily overwhelmed.

Belatedly, Finn recalled the distant knowledge that chocolate produced 'endolphins' – chemicals in the brain, that made people experience inexplicable happiness. And who said he never listened in chemistry!

"Come on, dude, you know you can talk to me. Why does all of this bother you so much?" Finn frowned, sorry to resurge the issue again, but determined to resolve it.

After a moments hesitation, Kurt shrugged;

"Because, he's my dad." And that in itself was answer enough.

Finn had long since accepted the inevitability that most of the things Kurt did, he would never understand. That their founding reasons would eternally elude him. And he could live with that, because he trusted Kurt's judgement, maybe just a little better than anyone else's, because, despite his flaws, his brother always did the right thing in the end. But this time, Finn thought he _did_ understand.

For, after all, didn't he feel the self-same protectiveness towards his mother? The one who had been there through every stage of his life, supportive, encouraging, constant. Didn't the insults which were extended to Carole, through marriage fill him with the same anger and indignation? Wouldn't he be outraged and devastated if, after facing the very real prospect of losing her, someone then made light of that pain for their own amusement? Wouldn't he strive to shelter and defend her if he thought he could? But it seemed there was one thing Finn knew which Kurt appeared ignorant:

"But, you know it doesn't mean anything, right? No, listen to me," Finn implored when Kurt showed every sign of interrupting. Waiting for the smaller teen to indicate his continuation. "It just shows that Sue is threatened by our campaign. Honestly, it's classic psyching out the competition: if a team thinks it's gonna lose, then it picks out the oppositions strongest player, and hurls them with insults until it throws them off their game and the losing team can get a shot in. It's underhand but it works – we do it all the time." And Puck was its patriot, Finn slightly more reserved.

"But this isn't football, Finn," supplied Kurt without irritation, just tired defeat.

"I know," said Finn, simply, "but that doesn't mean the tactics aren't the same."

Kurt mulled that thought over for a while, until it became like an epiphany to the hopeless, and all the time, Finn just sat in silence; un-presumptuous, accommodating and completely oblivious to the gravity and magnitude of his words. He simply gave Kurt opportunity to think, in the presence of one who would defend him to the end.

That was the first time Kurt truly realized how much people underestimated his brother. So Finn wasn't book-smart, big deal – but what he did have was an intelligence entirely his own, something a fraction more precious than the average.

"You know, Burt would pull out of the running if he thought it was making you unhappy," said Finn, tone absent of inflection, his eyes taking in the room at large without really seeing it.

The kitchen-come-diner was different but somehow similar to the one he had grown up knowing: the heart of a house which was now up for sale, full of memories, full of feeling. It was as if the Hudson's very presence was an impressionate motif upon its ambiance; maybe his mom had convinced Burt to redecorate, or maybe it had just always looked that way, he'd never really thought about it before. He had never thought that they would give up their old house and the lingering memories of a man both husband and father, in favour of another, either. In fact, he never thought a lot of things, which were now the fabric of his life, would happen. But every now and then, a good thing can surprise you.

"I know," sighed Kurt, distractedly tearing up one of the crumpled sheets which adorned the sturdy oak table like some relative compilation of modern art, into delicate and shapely leafs of confetti. "That's part of the reason why I went to see Sue, actually. He's the one person I can't hide anything from, and I don't want him to pull out of the running, least of all because of me. He deserves a chance to dream for himself; to change the world, or do something great." The way Kurt smiled when he envisioned his father in every success was heart-warming. "Only …" he seemed to choke on the words.

"Only, what?" Finn enquired gently, subconsciously learning towards his brother in an act of would be comfort.

Kurt's hands momentarily ceased their work, and he took a shallow breath; determinedly avoiding Finn's gaze.

"Only … I don't want him to be torn down or penalized because of the actions of people around him. I don't want things which aren't his fault, and are outside of his control, to dictate the success or failure of his campaign. But it doesn't matter how hard he tries, there are _always_ going to be things that people can use against him, things people can use to hurt him."

He redoubled his creative efforts with gusto; the infirm scales of his faceted emotional spectrum having shifted once again.

Though he dressed it up with words to the contrary, which defied the elders understanding, Finn immediately understood the integral issue. He had never met someone so full of confidence, and yet, so full of doubt as Kurt; a stigma unto himself. And he glimpsed in his features for an instant that self same fear of resent and shame, as had once affronted him without dilution. Kurt was proud of who he was, but he never truly believed that others could be too.

"You're just waiting for them to spin the 'gay son' angle, aren't you?" It was said with sympathy and hurt. Kurt neither confirmed nor denied it, but Finn knew it to be true. "Kurt, anybody who matters to you, doesn't care, and those who do care, don't matter. It isn't an issue for them, so don't let it become one for you, because if you do, then somewhere down the line, you'll look back and wind up hating yourself. Look, two years ago, I never would have thought I'd be sitting here talking to you. But if Mr. Schue and Glee's taught me anything, it's that; difference is _brilliant_. So, don't be afraid to be, because Burt's proud of you, and I am too."

Kurt smiled for the first time that night, and it banished all traces of despondency from his countenance, lighting his eyes like nebulas bursting into life in a universe of combustible heat. He looked like some photographer should capture his image and preserve it evermore as a symbol of hope and unity.

The spoken word could wound, but redemption was found also in the fact that, employed correctly, it healed its own wanton destruction.

His limbs renounced a stiff tension that he did not know they had retained.

"Thank you; that means a lot," and then shaking his head, laughing, "somehow, you always wind up saying exactly the right thing, I don't even think you know you're doing it. I guess somewhere between all that empty space there's good sense," he teased, amusement for an instant cloaking the imperfections of exhaustion which so plagued his visage.

Finn offered the leg of Kurt's chair a retaliatory kick, in a high mockery of indignation, inadvertently banging his elbow, and banishing three of the balled up sheets from the table. Ignoring Kurt's smug utterance of; 'serves you right,' he leaned over to retrieve them from the floor, then, with a mischievous grin and the obvious reflexes of a quarterback, delivering upon his step brothers face and shoulders, the trio of missiles in rapid succession and with infallible aim.

Kurt's shout of surprise and protest, along with the unintentional but seemingly ever present, theatrics of his reaction, almost had Finn bend double with breathless laughter. But even at a deficit, he still managed to expertly dodge four of Kurt's return shots. The fifth he even managed to pluck out of mid-air single-handedly, commending his own effort with ardour.

"Show off," Kurt accused with nothing but warm admiration and pride, seeking in vain to land at least one missile upon its target.

Finally, Finn's laughter ceased, and taking up a hand of discarded papers, almost lost to hysterics again at the way Kurt threw up his hands to protect himself from the supposition of a large scale counter-attack, he asked:

"What are all of these anyway?"

"Campaign ideas." Kurt rolled his eyes, looking slightly despairing.

With all the excitement of Christmas morning, Finn began smoothing out crumpled spheres at random, until they were legible and reading aloud, as if they held just as much interest for Kurt as they did for himself:

"A free meal at Breadsticks for every vote," he whistled, "wow, that's going to cost you … A fashion surgery every Thursday to, quote; '_combat the influx of sartorial abortions,_' underlined; Rachel Berry …"

Kurt suddenly became highly enthralled with the tea stain on the counter-top as Finn gazed at him, his features moulding into an expression that Kurt hated to be the cause of.

"I like Rachel's clothes … 50 votes for Kurt equals a day of cancelled lessons, not sure how well that'll go down with Figgin's, but it's a good one … and this is just a drawing of a unicorn …" Finn looked from the page, to Kurt, and back again. Yep, defiantly still a unicorn, "I don't get it." He raised an eyebrow.

But Kurt simply dismissed his confusion, offering no explanation less cryptic than:

"It was Brittany's idea anyway, I don't even know what made me think about it." He shook his head slightly.

Finn was even more bemused, because the last time he checked, Kurt and Brittany had been running against each other, so what were they doing collaborating campaign ideas? The workings of politics eluded him.

Brittany had called him a unicorn, but what did that even mean? Was it a magic that depended upon belief? Or was it one which made true impossible things even against the adversity of doubt? Right now, Kurt didn't feel very unicorn.

It seemed that every dream he forged: NYADA, New York, slipped from his grasp one by one, hopeless and lost, and there was no way to fight any harder in order to retain them. His entire future lay in the decisive hands of a single student population, who were more easily swayed by the promise of sugary handouts than mandates of true and advantageous change. Hello situations hopeless.

"But, I thought you weren't going to do any of this stuff? I thought you said you wanted your campaign to be about making a difference, something honest, something that didn't have to rely on bribery, false promises and gimmicks to get the point across … how come you changed your mind?"

The logic of it evaded Finn. It was like him training to play quarterback all season and then deciding to play tackle an hour before the championship game.

"I – I didn't." Kurt realized with humour instead of affront.

It wasn't that he was hopeless at coming up with campaign ideas, it was that his heart just simply wan not in it, and didn't that lend flight to the soul. Deep down, he had known such efforts contravened his moral stand, and that was why they had proven futile. Sometimes in the grips of dilemma, all it took to find enlightenment was the observation of a friend. Often we are ignorant to the profound effects our words render.

Finn brandished the hand drawn, mythological creature as if in emphasis, though it didn't strictly find its allegiance as a gimmick.

"No, I didn't," Kurt insisted. "Why should I give up everything I stand for just because someone tore it down and told me it was no good? I mean, come on, have I been walking through my life blind for the last seventeen years?"

"Exactly!" agreed Finn, lending his voice to a second accord, feeling all of the significance of the moment.

The underdogs would never be defeated, even when denied, pushed aside and oppressed, they would always come back fighting. No-one ever wanted to be labelled a loser, but they had long since made that title their own, and as such, altered its connotations from something negative into something good.

"You don't need public stunts and gimmicks to make your campaign great, Kurt, it already is. I dunno, maybe you'll come up with something even better, an angle you never saw before, but only ever change it because you _want_ to, not just because somebody said you should. People will respect you for sticking to your guns."

"See, always with the right thing!" Kurt glowed. He truly pitied those poor souls from whose life Finn remained a stranger.

Meanwhile, Finn just soaked up the compliment, for, coming from a boy who was unaccustomed to offering or receiving them, they were gold dust. He remained also almost entirely convinced that he was an unintentional genius.

"So all these …" Finn hinted, tossing one of the balled up sheets expertly into the air and catching it single-handedly.

"Can go in the bin, yeah." Kurt grinned at his step-brothers incessant enthusiasm, which was more that a little contagious. Then propping the lid of the trash can open so it presented a feasible target, he called;

"Knock yourself out."

For five minutes Finn tossed ball after ball of rejected inspiration into the trash, marvelling slightly at the scope of Kurt's initiative. Meanwhile, Kurt himself made the occasional shot; each and every one of them going wide, unarguably validating his rum-chocolate soufflé analogy.

So, when the kitchen-come-diner was once again visible beneath the fall out of Kurt's frustration, it was to find the latter in a state of mind which, while similarly exhausted, was more genial towards the prospect of spending an exceedingly long night sifting through complex quotations and recurrent themes and motifs. He couldn't help the prejudice of the world; the only thing that could ever be done was to lead the blind into the light and pray their ignorance was not too ingrained for them to see it.

"Can I have my laptop back now? I swear I'll stay away from propaganda," Kurt yawned, placidity overruling his natural sarcastic tendencies. He just need to get through this week, and then he could indulge in a brief repose.

"No way dude," Finn denied with a rare authority, "you're taking the night off. No arguments."

Kurt blinked slightly, taken aback, while Finn adopted an expression so akin to Carole's that for an instant the former was made breathless with surprise. It was the depiction of sternness, but unlike any other face which wore it, it was softened with an innate and eternal tenderness and compassion, just as Carole's very presence was the vessel of beautiful, unassuming nature.

For a moment, Kurt wondered sadly whether his father ever saw, reflected upon the face of his son, the mother and wife lost in one fell swoop. Their parents marriage, his and Finn's brotherhood, it was more than just love; it was healing. Each gained in the form of another, that single and desperate yearning which life had already once denied them.

Given that the scope of difference between their ages was measured in months as oppose to years, it was unsurprising to note that neither brother embodied the typified roles of sibling archetypes, but were rather a pliant melding of innocence and experience, morality and mistake, contention and comfort. They found themselves taking the moral high ground on one issue and then suffering admonishment for its immediate successor. And though the infrequent times that Finn exercised authority, it was usually with perception and good sense, it didn't mean that Kurt always accepted it.

"I can't afford to sit around and do nothing, Finn. I'm already behind, and there's a million and one things –"

" - Which will all still be there to obsess over tomorrow," countered Finn, curtailing Kurt's rant before it reached it's full strength.

"Somehow, that doesn't reassure me," Kurt rolled his eyes, tone thick with sarcasm as he tried, even unto himself, to deny the allure of a reprieve; the chance to just forget about everything, even if it was just for one night.

But Finn's purpose would not suffer digression:

"Come on. We haven't had a movie night in weeks, and its _my _turn to pick the movie. Besides, you know you don't really have a choice, because I'm the only one whose tall enough to reach your laptop, and I'd hear you dragging a chair across the kitchen."

It wasn't often Finn Hudson had the opportunity to gloat, and more infrequently still, to Kurt, whose sharp wit usually granted him the upper hand in any war of words, but he was not above an occasional bought of smugness, and certainly not tonight.

He knew he had Kurt convinced even before the smaller teen realized it himself, and so it was with pride that he watched as Kurt's expression thawed and resolved into angelic acquiesce, echoing a smile of indulgence. His step brother was one of the few people Kurt allowed himself to be swayed by without mustering up a defensive.

"Okay," he conceded, forgoing charade, and for a brief period, responsibility. "Fine, you win. But since you're forcing me – yes _forcing_ me," Kurt emphasized even as Finn snorted in disagreement; as if anyone could _force_ Kurt into doing anything he was opposed to. "I should at least get to chose the movie."Anything was worth a shot.

"Dude, last time you made me sit through _Titanic_. _Twice_. That's six hours I'll never get back." Finn dead panned, even as Kurt launched himself into a passionate defence of DiCaprio and Winslet's highly emotional yet heart-warming performances, and Celine Dion's timeless accompaniment.

But in the end, it didn't matter about democracy or equal rights, it didn't even matter what movie they wound up watching, because imbued in the most seemingly insignificant and unrelated moments of our lives, we are infrequently arrested by a true and awing appreciation of things hitherto taken for granted.

Kurt was nothing like the brother Finn had envisioned in the cradle hold of childhood, what he was, was something far superior. Sometimes, everything that you never thought you wanted was exactly everything that you needed. Through the trials of life they had grown close, and blood was nothing more than a meticulous particularity, to which people gave an exaggerated sense of import. They were family; heart and soul.

"Alright, you can pick." Finn punched the air in victory. "Just no …" Kurt had been about to run through a list of genres and plots he was simply not prepared to endure, when the intensity of Finn's joy at the prospect of just spending some quality time with his brother disarmed him. He felt strangely honoured.

"No, what?" Finn prompted after an extended pause, his brow furrowing in mild trepidation.

"Just … no movie night's complete without popcorn," Kurt grinned, moving towards the cupboards with a feeling of unconquerable elation. "And hey, don't press play until I get there." He warned knowingly.

He had never witnessed his oversized stepbrother look more like a child in the grips of some fit of excitement than in that moment, and it made him laugh to observe. Despite the stubborn independence, struggle for identity, contesting nature, general rebellion against any perceived form of authority or guidance's voice of experience, and exemplified adolescence, which lent strength to the conviction that a person was untouchable, they were still young, still had their entire lives ahead of them, and that was a thing which could easily be forgotten in the intensity of life itself.

Kurt could honestly say that he had never wanted for the presence of a sibling. Even in infancy, he had been independently minded and more inclined towards solitary pursuits. Then, proceeding his mothers passing, for a long time afterwards, his dad was really the only person who he had wanted and needed in his life; his heart made too constricted to bare the invitation of another. And by the time grief had resolved into acceptance, he had been both too old and too cynical to entertain the childish wish. No, the first thing he could ever remember wanting was a pair of sensible heels.

So how, during the definitive period of life, which in its very nature placed less import and value upon the sustaining organ of the family, than is deserved or ever again equalled, did he gain the brother he had never sought, and the mother figure he thought callous life had denied? Though it was invariably true that stranger things had happened, that convoluted sequence of events which one year on constituted normality, was definitely up there with the best of them. Someone, somewhere had a sardonic sense of humour, and an appetite for the keen indulgence of irony.

The microwave whirred as it counted down the seconds, its droning punctuated by a crude and ill timed composition of pops. A slow and lethargic tattoo initially, but one which soon gained violence and voice.

He could hear Finn moving around in the adjoining room; the hollow clatter of plastic cases being impatiently pushed aside before a triumphant shout was offered into the air. Knowing Finn they were probably about to settle down to some violent combat movie with confusing action sequences, high speed chases, explosions and loaded one liners. But even that could not diminish the draw of the repose.

How did love retire to the rear seat of platonic feeling? Kurt was still trying to figure that one out. Maybe he had just been misguided. After all, his former self of two years past was a person, for the most part, unrecognisable to him now. Bitter, full of bad feeling and conspiratorial – they were unattractive qualities even within the most beautiful person. But a million decisions made in ignorance chanced upon elation, and of the things and people who made him, his dad, Carole, Blaine and Finn were the most dear.

But their transition from almost strangers to brothers had been an arduous process of trial and error and frequent miscommunication, until they had found identification and acceptance. It had been a learning curve like no other. There were regrets, of course, admitted without hesitation; of words said and taken in anger; of truths delivered without tact; of assumptions and contentions grown and fattened on superstition, when they should have been shunned and starved, but such was the nature of adjustment. And their turbulent beginnings only promised a more celebrated future by comparison.

For good measure, Kurt heated up a pan of warm milk, salivating as the two scents intertwined. He remembered the first time he had offered it to Finn; it was extended as a gesture of solidarity after what had been a particularly trying week for his brother. Miserable, Finn had refused both the hot drink and the offer of a sympathetic ear, inadvertently adding more bricks to the wall between them at a time when their relationship had been at its most precarious.

In similar circumstances, the offer had been extended again, and two times subsequent had been given reproof, until Kurt gave it up as hopeless. Then, on a night less notable than many others they had shared, unable to sleep, Finn had padded down into the kitchen to find Kurt sitting alone in the darkness; eyes full of emotion, expression devoid of awareness, sipping the sweet nectar. Finn had poured himself a glass from the pan still cooling upon the stove and sat in silence with his brother until the sun rose. For reasons unbeknown, that night had marked a turning point in their relationship.

"Are you ready?" Came Finn's enquiry of ill concealed impatience from the darkness.

"Almost," Kurt called, tipping the still steaming popcorn into a bowl before juggling the three items with expert ease and ferrying them to the low standing coffee table which fronted the sofa.

Finn instantly reached for his glass, noisily drinking down a good half of it in one, before smacking his lips appreciatively. Kurt just rolled his eyes. And this was the boy who was so unwilling to try anything new without first performing a two hour dissection. There were probably far nastier things lurking in all the fast food he possessed such an apatite for, than he would ever find in an adventurous home-cooked meal. But upon the matter, Finn was incorrigible.

Kurt took a seat upon the opposite end of the sofa, placing the popcorn between them and taking a hasty handful before Finn got into his stride. Even so recently as a couple of months back, this measure of proximity between them would have resulted in discomfort all around, but now it was as easy and as effortless as breathing. Life was an impossible mistress to predict.

Finn pressed play and the opening title sequence of _X-Men_ blossomed across the screen. He glanced at Kurt out of the corner of his eye, almost daring him to dispute the film choice, but instead his brother just grinned, with a barely perceptible shake of his head.

See, genius, utter genius! Who else could pick a film – first time – that not only did Kurt not object to, but actually caused him to smile? … Well, maybe Blaine … But wait, why was he discrediting himself?

Meanwhile, Kurt chased fond remembrances. The first time he had ever watched this film was with his dad; curled up in the easy chair with a blanket strewn across them. It had been Christmas, and the house felt lonelier than ever, but yet for that hour and a half, they were as content as two people can be, because nothing else but the feel of each others heartbeats and the embrace of each others arms mattered. Then, preparing dinner a little later, Burt had impersonated Wolverine with the kitchen utensils, and the two of them had laughed like they had not done in a long while. Like everything, almost, the memory was tinged with both joy and sorrow.

They watched the first half of the moive in silence, trading handfuls of popcorn and mouthfuls of tepid milk, until something which had eluded Kurt in the face of his own troubles, returned to him with vengeful realization.

The neatly packed gym bag, the distinctive lack of that particularly pungent odour of school soap, the punctuality. Every one of those bizarre occurrences only further reinforced the disquieting knowledge. But why had he tried to conceal it?

There is something integrally selfish rooted in even the best nature, which infrequently renders us blind and unwilling. When consumed by the issues that are our own affair, we tend to forget, reduce, or else disregard the plights of others. Seeking sympathy and comfort from their words, but finding ourselves tardy when the responsibility comes to return the favour. It is selfish but true; that none of us feels the encumbrance of troubles quite so heavily as when the fall upon ourselves. Anything else we deem less.

Kurt surveyed his stepbrother through the darkness, debating whether to confront him or allow the matter to lie. But then, Finn had granted him a willing ear, so wasn't it only fair that he returned the kindness, even if the speaker at first would find himself unwilling?

Taking a deep breath and retaining a stoic, reserved note in his tone, Kurt enquired with true concern:

"Finn, how come you didn't go to football practice today?"

He felt Finn stiffen beside him; the first protocol of defence when he feared confrontation. And Kurt didn't need the glow of the TV screen to descry the constitution of Finn's expression, it was one he could have seen even with his eyes closed, because it was one that he knew well. The furrowed brow, lined with guilt; the way his skin renounced a little of its usual colour, and the eyes which usually laughed cast in suspicion; guarded and averted from the gaze of his brothers. His lips formed soundless words, and Kurt almost regretted bringing it up.

"I – I did" he attempted to deny, but it was without conviction, making the words sound as hollow and empty as they were.

"Puck called. He thought you must have been sent home sick or something, because surely you wouldn't _purposely_ miss three practices in a row. Coach Bieste is none to pleased, by the way. Apparently the position of Quarterback is pretty essential."

Kurt paused for a moment, allowing Finn to absorb the gravity of his actions and the possible repercussions. Even doing nothing had its consequences when one was torn by indecision.

Now Finn was extremely uneasy, for he fidgeted like a man forced to wear shirt of burlap sacking, and his features were tormented by the panic of a decision made in the height of emotional upheaval, which hadn't really been given thought. A rabbit in the headlights indeed.

One of the things Kurt admired most about his brother was his desire to do right by everybody, even at the expense of doing right by himself. There was not another sole anywhere with a bigger heart or a kinder nature than the over-large child that was his brother, but even the noble ones can lose their way occasionally, and Kurt was determined to show him back into the light.

"Don't worry," he assured him, "I covered for you. I told Puck that you _did_ come home sick, with some twenty-four hour thing, and that no, he couldn't speak to you because you were sleeping it off and I wasn't prepared to suffer your foul mood at having been woken up. I was pretty convincing, even if I do say so myself." God he was wasted as an alibi!

The look of relief which flooded across Finn's features would have been comical but for the tenor of their conversation.

For the merest fraction of a second, a smile broke upon his lips as water upon a damn, before retreating just as rapidly when he remembered that their conversation was far from concluded.

Kurt watched him intently, for Finn's face foretold a thousand emotions, which, even if his heart was recast in stone, he could never hope to conceal from the world. It was a trait which they both shared, though only a few were adept at reading them.

"So, they're off your back for the moment, at least, but what I want to know is; why? Why lie and pretend you were still going? Why _haven't_ you gone? It's not like you, Finn. You're not the sort of person who just gives up on his team-mates, or just puts in half the effort; it's part of what makes you so great as a leader. Now, I don't pretend to know much about football, but it seems to me like you haven't gone to a single practice since the scout showed up."

And Kurt knew immediately that he had struck a nerve, for Finn's jaw went rigid, as if there was a truth he was guarding himself against delivering.

"I know you're disappointed …"

"That was my final shot, Kurt." The words were spoken so defeatedly and tremulously that Kurt was at first uncertain whether he had really heard them or not. His brother had never sounded so broken.

Finn stared at his hands as they rested, clasped upon his lap as if protecting in their embrace the last vestiges of a dying hope, which to relinquish, meant to face a world of emptiness beyond. Where even dreams died.

"My final shot and I blew it." There was heavy regret and disappointment in his tone, but it seemed he had turned the knife upon himself; weighing the situation upon some failing or fault of his own.

Kurt was a little taken aback, because up until that moment, Finn had not displayed anything other than complete indifference towards the scouts selection. It looked like he wasn't the only one capable of hiding his feelings from the world when he wanted. Both brothers, afraid to seem like disappointments to their respective parents, confided in one another, without really realizing that they had ever let their guard down, and let each other in.

"Finn, you couldn't have tried any harder, so please, don't think like that. It's his fault if he can't see how good of a player you are, and his loss that he didn't select you. But there's other teams … There'll be other opportunities …"

Kurt attempted to reassure him without success, for Finn's next statement, heavy with solemn inevitability, fractured his words into falsehoods.

"The scout season's ended. That was my last shot." Then, he turned the full devastation of his eyes on Kurt, who almost shuddered under the intensity of their gaze. "What am I supposed to do now? I'm failing nearly all of my classes. Football was the only certain thing I had, and now I don't even have that. Rachel said I just had to find a new dream, but that's not so easy as she makes it sound. I don't have anything left to dream."

"So you're just going to give up?" Kurt raised an eyebrow, his voice a little harsher than he had intended through the filter of disbelief.

Finn just shrugged, muttering something incomprehensible.

"Finn," softer now, almost pleading, "you can't give up. Hey," he nudged the taller teen with his foot when he returned no response, causing Finn to flinch and protect his side. "Where would we all be if we had just given up after losing out on the Nationals title, _twice_? Or after Sue booked up the auditorium for the Cheerio's so we couldn't practice? Or after we thought we couldn't get the money to pay for Artie's transport to Regionals, or even get to Regionals; period? Or all the other times Sue's tried to disband us? Or when Figgin's threatened to cut our budget the first thousand times?" Finn laughed and Kurt echoed him. "I mean, come on, we're the masters of second chances; the true spirit of the underdogs! Surely that shows that a dream is worth fighting for, even when it seems hopeless?"

A reluctant smile of assent alighted upon Finn's lips, almost as if he had known this all along, but had needed some other vessel to share his faith also. Finn Hudson was remarkable in many ways, and none so prominently as in his ability to cast off the oppression of despondency. Some had ventured to call it a lack of emotional depth; the way his mood could suffer instant elevation, but Kurt found it more synonymous with strength of character.

"I'm right and you know it," he teased, while Finn flicked a rejected piece of popcorn at him for his arrogance.

"Oi! But you know, most people don't do things because they want to be the best, or even because they want to win, not really. They do them because it makes them happy. Does football make you happy? As happy as I've seen you in glee club?"

Finn thought about that for a long moment, as if he were seeking an answer concealed deep within his soul; a delicate honesty which had finally gathered strength enough to force its way into the world. His expression was a strange composite of dreamy wonder and severity.

"Yeah … Yeah, it does. When I'm standing on that stage singing, or when I go in for a tackle with the roar of the crowd deafening me … It feels like I could do anything if I tried."

Kurt smiled. He knew that sensation all too well; it was a euphoria which would never diminish, no matter how many times you experienced or sought it. If there was ever a measure of life contained within a single moment, it was in those stolen minutes of a king. He cocked his head slightly to the side;

"So then, what's the problem?" And the realization which dawned upon Finn's face was practically instantaneous. "Of all the boys who play high-school football, I bet you only about a tenth secure scholarships, and of that, maybe a quarter actually forge a career out of it. But let me ask you this: do you believe that all those boys who never made it gave up loving the game? Would you?"

"No. Never."

And Kurt could almost perceive the visions as they played out in Finn's mind; penetrating the darkness like a hologram, and he sighed with contented resolution.

"Then, you have your answer."

For all Kurt elected the high-road of hope, he knew what it meant to come so close to loosing a dream; how it almost hurt to breath as a piece of your heart and a wisp of your soul shrivelled and died. A life without dreams is a night without stars; blank and desolate.

To have those dreams dependant on the fickleness of others, was a cumbersome burden to bare. He wished there was something he could do to secure their futures. He had always been self orientated, but lately it seemed like there was an influx of people in his life who he would willingly surrender the world for, and wasn't that a novel experience?

"But all of that still doesn't explain _why_ you didn't go to training …"

Finn shrugged, nonchalant now, though evidently there had been some great distress at the heart of his actions.

"I didn't want to face them. They all knew how badly I needed that scholarship. Bad enough feeling sorry for myself, I didn't want to see them feel sorry for me too. I was ashamed, I thought I'd screwed everything up; people don't like to advertise their regrets."

That was true enough. Sometimes the sympathy of a cohort given in lieu of shortcoming, was inadvertently the worst kind of goading. People don't even like to admit that they are wrong, or that they pooled all their hopes into an opportunity which bore no fruit, much less publicise it. Self-criticism, we weather, but the criticism of others possesses always a more penetrating and affronting quality.

Kurt knew the whispers of the hallway; the hushed conversations which were quelled a little too conveniently when he walked by, and some people did not even possess the decency for that mercy. He could only imagine what that would do to Finn, because his modesty notwithstanding, his brother _needed_ to be liked.

"I don't blame you. People have missed more for less. Where did you go instead?" The question was slightly redundant, because where else did Finn go when he was troubled?

"Bowling." It was said with a laugh that was not even a tenth repenting. "I hit five strikes in a row." Kurt raised an eyebrow in mock disbelief, though he knew Finn to be more than capable of the feat, igniting Finn's insistence. Sometimes it was just too easy, even if it did earn him an inconsiderate shove.

"Anyway, you should come and play with me one day."

Kurt laughed. What disastrous results would yield from their competitive natures being pitted against one another he didn't dare imagine. But maybe one day he would allow Finn to coerce him into playing a match; so long as he thought his pride could suffer it, because he wouldn't hold out for a victory.

Everyone found solace and clarity in a small anchor of the world; maybe in a place of blissful connotations, maybe one engorged with memory, maybe not even in a place at all but something more material; an object, turgid with meaning or memory, maybe even in a person; that dependable patron who is you entire past, present and future; in the loving words of a parent, or the guidance of a friend. Every person had their harbour.

However, how Finn found that grounding, those cherished moments of content, in the bright lights, discordant music and pulsing ambiance of a bowling alley eluded Kurt, but then again, it wasn't his lifetime, and he didn't need to understand it to appreciate its worth. We all needed a sanctuary, a salvation ground concealed in plain sight.

"Don't let what people may think put you off Finn; you can always change their minds. You're going to do great things with your life, you know, even if you can't see that yet."

Finn grinned even despite himself, his whole face lighting up with the expression. Faith meant more than any physicality could describe. It was like a wish; untouchable, but potent nonetheless.

"So are you," he returned with feeling.

Kurt hoped so. He wanted his life to mean something a little greater than the average, but the enormity of a million roads and chances humbled and deterred him sometimes. The faith of his brother was like a lantern in the mist, guiding him home, and suddenly, he was unafraid. What would be, would be, and their was no sense in lamenting it, nor fretting over a future with every waking thought, when it would still continue to defy man's every attempt to predict.

But that which _could_ be seized and availed was the present, or the all too recent past, depending upon you suit for tenses.

Finn felt a certain amount of protectiveness towards Kurt, and the latter was not without his family loyalties also, though they were more attuned towards defensiveness than protection. Kurt had defended the virtuous intentions of Finn's actions even when everyone else condemned their outcome in the past.

But the one thing, above all else, which he would not willingly suffer, was anyone hurling derogatory insults or put downs at his loveable, good natured and often noble brother, who was all at once wonderfully childlike and potently intuitive. Finn read the implications of actions much easier than words – the meanings of which, more often than not, eluded him like abstract notions. It was a weakness many knew, and some even sought to use against him, the act of which both enraged and devastated Kurt; a cruelty tantamount to kicking a defenceless puppy just because one could.

So having to stand mute and forcibly indifferent as the New Directions and the Troubletones squared off in front of each other, and Santana spilled insults from her lips with more toxicity than poison, had taken more self restraint than Kurt had ever dreamed he possessed. In that moment, he had wanted nothing more than to brutally pierce the ever spiteful Latina with a few home truths. It was true that no-one could triumph over her acid wit, but that didn't mean that sometimes he didn't feel fool enough to try. And not for the first time, he wondered whether her words tasted as sour in the speaking as they sounded in deliverance.

His entire body had shook with the strain of repressed emotion, so that, as soon as Blaine had converged upon him and taken a single glance at his expression, he had known all the pain silence had cost him. And then, Blaine had slipped his hand into Kurt's, a gesture usually reserved for more private settings, and lead him away; that touch always saying more than words could ever convey.

Finn of course, had been entirely unaffected by the whole episode. It was true that they both got more riled by the comments hurled at the other, than ever the ones hurled at themselves.

But even hours later, when the confrontation was passed and retired to unworthy memory, Kurt still felt the necessity for some small gesture to pass between them. Even if it were just an acknowledgement of their solidarity, even if just to confirm that the wrongs of others did not go unnoticed.

"Off the subject, I know, but about what Santana said today: don't listen to it. Her words don't mean anything."

"Kinda hard not to listen when she's practically yelling in your face," Finn laughed with an unaffected air.

Rather than roll his eyes at the evident exaggeration, Kurt chose instead to note something a little more profound; the way Finn's eyes averted their gaze, discernible even in the darkness, meaning that, for all his composure, Santana's words had actually wounded him … Kurt glimpsed him for a second as a stranger and accordingly re-evaluated his understanding.

"Maybe," he conceded, "but take it from a person who knows. The people who prey on the insecurities of others largely do so because they can't bring themselves to admit the crushing weight of their own. They want everyone else to bare the same burden as they do, because then, it's not such a frightening prospect. They want to make others hurt at least as much as they are hurting themselves; make them feel helpless, inadequate, for all the times they have condemned themselves and wished that they could change some integral flaw. Therefore, they distract themselves by causing others to confront their insecurities, in the vain hope that it will somehow alleviate the brutal hold of their own, but instead they are only forced to face an empty truth which they design to run from; that those actions never have and never will. And the ones who shout loudest, are the ones who hurt the most; the ones who are most afraid. Do you really think someone as harsh and bitter as Santana isn't twice as harsh upon herself? Trust me Finn, whatever she says is meaningless, because she possesses insecurities ten times greater than you ever will."

Finn's expression was distant, a man re-reading the situation as a casual observer, but there was something akin to delicate sympathy slowly animating the vacant set of his features. Kurt knew automatically that Finn would find his way towards forgiveness, it was a divine trait which found its stock in their small family. Meanwhile, Kurt felt unease stir within him without really knowing why.

Revelation came quickly to Finn; limited despondency forgotten.

"What do you know?" It was an enquiry absent of suspicion; timid and almost pleading.

Kurt adopted an air of mystery, though their was a fierce moral conviction behind it; only resisting the compulsion to comfort his brother with the truth through great personal restraint and a loyalty undeserved.

"Something which isn't my secret to tell. But something that's obvious, so long as you open your eyes to the possibility."

He didn't like her, but that didn't mean he was about to out her, not even to his brother. Her struggle struck something deeply personal within him, because the struggle to accept yourself is a more difficult and weary road than one walked to win the acceptance of others. He guessed he understood her, as far as anyone could comprehend a single aspect of Santana's fiery, vicious and combustive personality, because there had been a time, not too long passed, when he had embodied the same cynicism that characterised her, a time when life its self had seemed nothing if not barren and hostile. But maybe towards her plight he would be more sympathetic if she curbed her wounding tone when speaking to his brother.

Out of the darkness Finn laughed, a single ironic syllable which seemed somewhat impertinent to the saturated silence. He was speaking even before Kurt's increasingly sluggish mind reinvigorated itself to absorb meaning from the words;

" … supposed to be making _you_ feel better, and all you've done since is reassure _me_." There was a compound of humour and admonishment in his tone.

"Glad to be of service," Kurt yawned, "beats spending five hours pouring over Shakespeare texts anyway."

Finn repressed the urge to gasp. The idea that anybody would spend such an extended period doing homework was nothing short of nightmarish to him, and he was convinced that the practice should be employed as a means of psychological torture. The CIA would soon have spies all over the world spilling their most closeted secrets like slavering infants. Finn didn't do scholastic devotion, wherever knowledge went wanting, he got creative. He once wrote a book report on Of Mice and Men without even opening the cover, just made it all up as he went along. He had gotten an F for his trouble, but that must have meant their was some credit to his work, because, hey, at least it wasn't a minus.

Kurt wondered absently why he was so tired all of a sudden. He was warm and comfortable, his limbs were growing heavy, seizing him with a disinclination to move, and it felt so good, but yet he fought it. Holding onto the sound of Finn's voice, the small movements beside him. He didn't want to sleep, not here, not now. But, why? Reality became infirm, blurred around the edges, and either the darkness undulated with voids of sightless black, or else his eyes periodically slipped closed against his will.

Suddenly, Finn bolted upright, and the movement startled him. There were a few seconds of shifting feet and wringing hands before he spoke, endeavouring in vain to sound nonchalant towards either eventuality.

"You're not going to tell mom that I missed football practice, are you?"

Kurt didn't need to look at him to see the way that the childish innocence of a boy knowing he had done wrong and fearing his parents disappointment, played out upon his features again. Maybe that formed part of the reason why nobody could ever stay mad at him, it was certainly the reason why Kurt couldn't.

"As long as you don't tell my dad that I spent my nights reading useless propaganda and getting upset about the lies Sue was spreading instead of focusing on my own campaign and doing my homework. Don't I regret it now," he added as a slightly sour afterthought.

"It's a deal."

They shook upon it like covert conspirators; brothers united in secrecy against the exasperation of their parents, and not for the first time.

So Kurt had never wanted a brother. So their transcendence had been a difficult one and could have gone either way; tipped towards hatred or love. So their had been mistakes, and regrets, and regrets again, those early months plagued with mishandled situations; simple scenarios overcomplicated with covert and unintentional prejudice. So things had at times seemed irresolvable, with every party in some form secretly lamenting the meeting of the other, even if they were too afraid to admit it to themselves. As bad as things had started out, it was something so much better which they became. And families by their nature were a wash with colourful issues; a bank of people who could make or break the life of their own. So by those rights, the Hummel-Hudson's were as successful as any.

But, most of the time, you can't measure the worth of something until you find it. And a brother, it seemed, was one of those things. Kurt had never needed anyone, or so he had thought, but having Finn watch out for him; living with his always vibrant and buoyant presence in a home more previously given to silence, having someone to talk to night and day – though their were still voids to be bridged – and just experiencing the simple pleasure of having someone by his side to weather the turbulent highs and lows of life with; to laugh with, even in the worst of times, and to have a friend privy to every flattering or embarrassing credential of life indiscriminately, made him realize just how lonely he had been beforehand. There were merits in having a brother, and even more in having one as great as Finn.

And, as much as his brother would seek to deny it, Kurt was smug to realize that they had undoubtedly, undeniably and unashamedly just had a 'lady talk.' And that, ladies and gentlemen was the power of warm milk.

Kurt didn't even realize that he had fallen asleep until a gentle but persistent shaking awoke him, and Finn's soothing tones penetrated the haze;

"Come on, dude, you can't sleep like that; you'll get a crick in your neck."

It took Kurt a few moments to ascertain what was going on, and during that time, he became increasingly aware of an aching stiffness in his neck, which confirmed Finn's analysis as being correct.

He reached up a clumsy hand to kneed the troublesome point.

"Told you!" And then a fond laugh; "you're such a doofus when you first wake up, you know."

And before Kurt could groan and protest that he was not any such thing, there was a large, warm palm against his back, gently forcing him up into a sitting position, and holding him there as he fought for awareness. Finn chuckled all the while.

With his first lucid thought, Kurt reflected that at least when he woke up it was in good time. Finn slept like death, and nothing short of a subterranean missile launch could rouse him in the mornings, well, that and Carole stripping him of his blankets, flooding the room with sunlight, and throwing open the window so that the noise of the traffic and the incessant prattle of birds poured into the room, either forcing him into obedience or driving him crazy. And he _snored_.

Though the room was still dark, the credits were rolling up on the screen. Kurt tried without success to piece together the point at which he must have fallen asleep. He rubbed his eyes, Finn's hand still against his back, though the necessity of such support had now passed. His brothers slow, even breathing was audible due to their proximity.

"How long was I out?" Kurt made a futile attempt to flatten down his hair. He could practically _feel_ it sticking up.

Finn ignored the action. Honestly, he had witnessed Kurt's bed-head so many times that one more wasn't going to make much difference. Initially, it had been amusing; Kurt had almost collapsed the first time Finn saw him pyjama clad and with hair un-brushed. But a year and a half later, it wasn't even that any more.

"Dunno. Not long. I asked you a question and you never replied. I looked over and you were asleep." Finn shrugged. "I can't remember my question," he added as an afterthought.

Kurt thanked small mercies. He could only imagine what an X-Men prompted query might entail, and the obscure answer it would necessitate.

"What time is it?" he stifled another yawn, trying to break the cycle, as permitance would only result in a more persistent exhaustion.

"A little past eight. Hey, I was thinking we could order in, for food I mean, since you're too tired and I can't cook. Mom left some money in the cupboard." He attempted discreet persuasion, but like his stature, his honest nature made concealment impossible.

Kurt stole a wistful glance towards the kitchen, where his laptop still occupied its forlorn roost. He usually prided himself upon his meticulously balanced diet, but the prospect of not moving from the couch to perform any preparation was a screaming enticement, and so for one night only, he relented.

"Sure. Get whatever you want and I'll just take some. I'm not that hungry."

Finn fixed him with a sceptical glance; he was starving! The popcorn and chocolate hadn't even touched the sides, and he couldn't imagine anyone ingesting not so much as half of that feeling anything less than famished.

"But if you're ordering pizza; no olives, no pineapple and –"

"Chill, I think I know your pizza order well enough by now." Finn rolled his eyes in a gesture that was so reminiscent of Kurt himself that the latter just had to stare for a moment, blinking like a man dazzled by his first glimpse of the sun, before dissolving into laughter.

Finn ignored him. The allure of food outweighing any curiosity as he smoothly dialled the number of his favourite take-out and ordered a large peperoni pizza and a list of sides better suited to a moderate dinner party than two brothers sitting at home on a Thursday night.

Finn ate like a horse, and by comparison, Kurt's appetite was mediocre. It was one of the few grounds upon which the brothers were compared (being so distinctly opposite) and it was the sorest, for Kurt especially. Being blunt, he really didn't appreciate people casting aspersions upon his eating habits, especially when their reference of judgement was a near six foot four football player, who harboured a particular fondness for junk food. Of course he would seem at a deficit compared. He laughed to remember a time when the issue had come to a head during one of their initial Friday night dinners, which had formed the foundation of their family, though it had been far from humorous at the time.

After little persuasion, Finn relented his stab at equality and let Kurt watch one of the musicals he was so fond of. Well, fond was perhaps a little too timid a description, the dude was obsessed!

Spending his first night in the relatively foreign territory of the Hummel household, Finn had been devastated to discover that their DVD library was comprised almost entirely of musicals, and of the particular tenor which could not be seriously watched by any self respecting man who dared to call himself masculine. And, as if that was not bad enough, they had, all of them, been _alphabetized_. That was the first time he had truly had doubts about what he and his mom were letting themselves in for.

The curtain rose upon the first scene of Blood Brothers; a preluding to tragedy, and tears were already forming in Kurt's eyes, lighting them like orbs as he whispered the dialogue in perfect sync.

Finn smiled fondly, he admired Kurt's dedication to the production, it was the same nurturing care and love he put into his own performances reflected. Although the two individuals were worlds apart, thrown together and forced to co-exist, there was within them enough common ground morality, heart and kindness to bridge the distance which would have otherwise swallowed them whole.

And frankly, Finn didn't think Blood Brothers was half bad, as far as musicals were concerned, and Kurt knew, and exploited frequently, his weakness for it. So the songs were numerous, and would never infiltrate the elite of timeless classics, so the sets were not real like the houses and streets on TV, and so it just didn't bare the same ambiance as watching a movie, the story was actually quite compelling, once you acclimatised to the fact that you were watching a _musical_.

Finn tried to appreciate the aesthetics of the production with the same reverent ardency Kurt had once used when outlining to him the beauty and devastation of each scene. The words had been lost upon him, but Kurt's tone had stirred something magical; an ecstasy which he was compelled to capture in its own right, and that night, he had seen what Kurt saw. But attempting the same feat now without guidance, he was forced to conclude that the practice was decidedly harder than his brother had made it appear.

Sure the wooden scenery was painted with an artistic hand, but he felt that that was rather missing the point.

The easy silence persisted for an extended period, until, grabbing his fourth slice of pizza, while Kurt still chewed through the crust of his first, Finn posed a loaded question which was like gifting kindling to a folly pyromaniac. It was a thought daily entertained, but infrequently shared, and even then, only usually with misery.

"Kurt, do you ever think about the future?" He feigned nonchalance as he plucked a piece of peperoni from his generous slice, chewing it with slow consideration. It was a pantomime distraction to divert attention away from the plethora of volatile emotions which, found life, ceased to be, and were reborn upon his features.

"Lately? All the time." Kurt admitted with blunt honesty, his voice a monotone, his eyes unblinking.

Finn recognised the signs and found comfort in them, when maybe instead he should have endeavoured to assuage them. Kurt was as daunted by the year ahead as he was. It seemed that knowing what you wanted from life ultimately didn't make the decisions simpler, nor the attainment of dreams easier. Maybe it just made the bitterness of failure harder to bare.

"Yeah, me too. It's like, everybody expects something from you, you know? A good GPA, awards for extra curricular's, for you to set an example, to put everything right, to have the answers even when no-one else does. Why can't college's just be like Glee club, where everyone gets in?" There was a note of desperation and absolute longing in his voice. "It's just, we're all supposed to be so sure about everything, but I've never felt so not sure -"

"_Unsure_," Kurt corrected automatically.

" - in my life. I – I don't want things to change."

And he set down the piece of pizza which he had been currently attending to, as if the very thought turned his stomach and forced his apatite into redundancy.

"People always talk about having a moment they wish they could live in forever, well, this is mine. Right here, because even though I lost the football scholarship, I'm happy. I love Rachel. I love seeing my mom so happy , and I love having a dad and a brother. So why does all that have to change?"

Finn, Kurt noted, looked at him in such a way that suggested he really held all the answers to these questions. Right then, Kurt wished he did, but instead, all he could say was;

"It doesn't. What makes you think that it does? The only thing which is going to change is that we'll be one year older and off to college."

And for the first time that night, Kurt was genuinely uncertain of who he was endeavouring to convince, because even he didn't believe the placating words which stumbled from his lips.

"_You'll_ be off to college," Finn corrected without ill feeling, "and Rachel too; all the way in New York. With my grades, I wont be getting in anywhere without a scholarship, and that chance is gone." He shrugged even while the implications of his words devastated him. "I like working in the auto shop, actually it's the only thing beside football which I'm sort of good at … but I don't want to be left behind. I don't want to spend my whole life in this town. I don't want to prove everyone right; that all along I was nothing more than a Lima Loser."

He practically spat the last two words, their taste putrid upon his tongue, while a cacophony of discordant memories echoed in his ears; taunts which, if he didn't take action now, would one day become truths.

"Finn," Kurt said slowly, crippled for a moment by his own hopelessness in partner to Finn's, "my chances of getting in NYADA are less then none-existent. Rachel's are a bit more favourable, however. But do you know what? Being certain about where you want to end up in life isn't all it's cracked up to be. Since I was five, I knew I either wanted to sing, or have a string of Broadway title-roles attached to my name, but just because I know what I want, doesn't stop me feeling uncertain about the future, or even about the present. I'm no closer to achieving my dreams than you are to achieving yours, except for the fact that I know what I'm aiming for. But maybe that's the whole point; great people are exactly that because they never gave up, even despite what life threw at them. Maybe its like a test of conviction. How far will you go for a dream ..."

Finn considered this for a moment, and most have found reassurance in the words of his brother, for the next moment, he reached for a slice of garlic bread and forced it into his mouth whole, chewing exaggeratedly, apparently keen to make up for lost time. Nothing was more indicative of Finn's mood than his appetite.

Encouraged, Kurt followed suit, though he chewed in a more demur and polite fashion, ignoring for the moment the remnant odour the tasty morsel would leave upon his breath. He wasn't seeing Blaine until tomorrow, and Finn had already ingested to impressive a quantity to be overly concerned with the consequences. That left a lot of spare hours for gum chewing and flossing.

"Besides," Kurt said, rolling his eyes, though he was genuinely troubled by the revelation that Finn, even in a fey mood would doubt their honour and integrity. "If by some miracle me and Rachel get in NYADA, do you seriously think we would leave you behind?"

"I guess not," Finn grinned wryly.

"Of _course_ not." It was as much a vow as reassurance. "And in your determined moroseness, you seem to have forgotten one thing …" He paused for dramatic effect, never one to squander a golden moment, while Finn only gazed at him with imploring eyes; which fought back the light of hope with waning resistance.

"Football's not the only type of scholarship … You're an amazing singer Finn, and it would be a waste not to pursue it. If we win Nationals this year, there wont be a college in the _whole of America_ who wouldn't jump at the chance to enrol us! Come with me and Rachel to New York. I'm working on convincing Blaine too, but just think about it; the four of us. We'd be unstoppable! You don't have to find a new dream, Finn, you just have to rekindle the fire of one you may have put aside." He knew the stigma attached to a male looking to pursue a career in theatre or singing, and so he offered a little worldly wisdom;

"Being popular is all well and good, but if you let other people dictate the choices that you make, then ten years down the line, you're going to look back and regret all the missed opportunities, and maybe regret will be the only thing you have to show for a lifetime forged by the prejudice of supposed friends turned strangers."

He didn't mean it to sound harsh; he just wanted Finn to be true to himself – maybe even be a little selfish sometimes, because his hopes and dreams mattered. Sometimes his brother ruled his life upon the fickle temperament of others, rather than listening to the directives of his own heart, and he just wanted Finn to realize that. The downfall of any selfless person was that their better nature could be more easily played upon and exploited by those who would seek to profit from misfortune, than their more cynical and less considerate peers. In everything, Kurt was always looking out for him.

And then baring no relation to their discussion and in fact derailing it completely, Finn came out with;

"I wonder if me and Rachel will ever get married …" His tone was slightly wistful, as if a desire kindled in ignorance now lit up the world.

And wasn't that a classic case of thinking aloud, for Finn's cheeks glowed a violent tincture when he realized he had actually spoken the words, but even the embarrassment didn't seem to dampen his conviction.

Kurt looked at him critically for a moment, reading more in Finn's expression than he ever had before. This was not merely an idle joke thrown into conversation, this was a real and he guessed, burning desire, and as such needed to be treated with due respect and sensitivity. It was uncertain turf for both of them.

"Would you like too?" Kurt asked quietly, lost in thought.

"Yeah," without hesitation, "someday. I guess thinking about the future made me realize that I always want Rachel to be a part of mine. I'd wait until I had a good job, maybe a nice house. Then, one night, I'd take her out, somewhere beautiful and fancy; make her feel like the luckiest girl in the world, and then, I'd get down on one knee, I'd present her with a ring, and I'd ask her to be my wife." He smiled as he spoke. The secret romantic.

The blush in Finn's cheeks deepened from rose to crimson, even as he endeavoured to remind himself that there was no shame in admitting this to his brother. If anyone knew weddings, it was Kurt.

"You really love her, don't you?" Kurt smiled.

"More than anything. When I kiss her, I don't just _see_ fireworks; I'm blinded by them." Then more shyly, "Do you think she'd say yes, if I asked her?"

"Finn, of _course_ she would!" Kurt laughed at the fact that he even felt the necessity to ask that question. "She's been in love with you from the very first moment she saw you, and probably even before that!" But the thought of Rachel Berry got Kurt,, by extension, thinking. He wanted to clarify one thing, before this whole affair was blown into epic proportions. "Although you'll have to, of course, hand over all creative control to Rachel, can I at least be the best man?"

His heart was giddy with the prospect. That this was a discussion of purely conjecture, concerning, if it did ever come to fruition, a far distant event which was little more than an ideal and a lot less than certainty, didn't matter, Kurt would be thrilled to be a part of it.

"Obviously!" And now it was Finn's turn to laugh. Then: "As long as I get to be best man at yours"

At this, Kurt chocked upon the soda he was unlucky enough to be drinking at the time. As Finn pounded upon his back, he cursed to the depths his infernal habit of always putting his foot in it.

"Sorry. Too soon?" he asked, tone saturated with repentance.

"A little," Kurt admitted as soon as recovered his breath. He knew it had been with the best intentions, but the comment had still caught him off guard.

However, that commitment meant more to him than Finn would ever know: it meant that Finn accepted him, and by extension, Blaine. It meant that he didn't view them any differently than two other people in love, and that knowledge became Kurt's world.

Thus far, Finn's feelings towards Blaine had been difficult to ascertain. There was some tension between them certainly, hidden beneath the surface; concealed by the mechanics of duty bound politeness, but it was there and Kurt could perceive it. It found its expression in sharp words and brusque opinions, which were, maybe in one case especially, determinedly contrived towards opposition.

A few times Kurt had confronted Finn over the way he spoke to Blaine during glee club, for there it seemed was where the nucleus of their discord found home. Worst of all, Blaine was beginning to think that Finn hated him, and the torture made prominent in his eyes in those moments, compelled Kurt to take him in his arms and hold him safe forever, to protect him from everything which had the potential to unseat that amazing smile.

For the most part, Kurt mollified his annoyance by chalking Finn's rudeness up to the protectiveness of a brother; that the lovable giant just didn't want to see Kurt get hurt. But wishful thinking only went so far, because, somehow, Finn's behaviour just didn't seem geared towards that motive. If Kurt didn't know better, he would swear it was almost like a jealous child acting out at the prospect of being told to share. But that was ridiculous, wasn't it?

"You'd really want to be the best man if Blaine and I ever …" somehow, he just couldn't bring himself to say it. Couldn't set himself up for disappointment. Even though the world claimed differently, there was still a daunting distinction between marriage and civil partnership.

"Sure I would! You're the only brother I've got Kurt." His words were heart-warmingly sincere. However, Finn ruined his own momentous moment by choosing to nosily slurp down noodle soup, only somehow, it worked to reinforce the truth and conviction of his words.

Kurt didn't know what to say. His brother had given him hope, day by day he was affronting the world with its own prejudice, and showing them all the way to acceptance in style. Not knowing adequately how to make Finn understand all that his words meant, Kurt instead told him that which he had never told anyone before, not even Burt.

"I'd like to one day, you know? I always want Blaine to be a part of my life; maybe a few years down the line we'll make it official. Already sometimes it seems like I can't even remember a time when he wasn't." Kurt smiled. Who would _want_ to remember such a time in which Blaine wasn't yet even a dream. "Hearing you talk about Rachel reminded me of everything I feel about Blaine, everything I guess I was scared to admit to myself. It's a big step, isn't it, admitting that you want to be with somebody for the rest of your life."

Finn nodded solemnly, and then pensively; "It's not so different as people make out is it? Love's still love; still just the same, no matter who it's with." He grinned.

"No," Kurt agreed happily, "it's not so different at all."

When their stomachs were swollen with indulgence, they pushed aside their left-overs. Kurt, at least was intending to clear them away later – and then reclined with practised symmetry; shunning the other, perfectly apt sofa for the cramped conditions of its partner.

Carole was remarkable in many ways; her easy-going nature taught her boys to make their own mistakes and learn from them, growing into the men she always knew they would be. The men who made the right choices, even if they were the hardest to bare. And always was she there with encouragement, or an embrace if things went wrong, never blaming and never absolving. But if she was like other mothers in any way, it was that she would not tolerate was last nights take-out served cold for breakfast.

It was a particularly prominent pet hate, which was given weight especially proceeding Burt's heart attack. As the matriarch of their small family, she saw it as her duty to instil in them the foundations of a healthy diet; healthy thinking, and she taught it by plenty of home-cooking.

Les Mis proceeded Blood Brother and Finn soon lost interest – no matter how many times Kurt impressed upon him the timeless empathy of the classic, all he could perceive was a tedious production from start to finish, the finer points of which loitered above and beyond his comprehension. Therefore, the resultant silence, devoid of any other source of amusement, niggled away at Finn like a persistent irritation that wanted for relief. He held out for half an hour, but then he just had to break it.

"Do you think senior year will be our best yet? From the way everyone talked about it and looked forward to it, I dunno, I thought it would be better. They made it sound like being a senior granted you some new higher privilege or something. But all its been so far is stress, disappointment and sadness. High-school seems like one of those things that no matter what happens, will never end; that those four years are the rest of your life, when really every minute, every day is continually counting down the time you have left without you even realizing it, and we don't have that long left. Then, _bam_, High-schools over, and everyone's off to collage …" He shrugged and sighed, the two motions in argument.

It had been a long time before Kurt identified the precise flicker of neuroticsm in Finn's nature which formed the foundation stone of his inability to remain tight lipped and reserved in any delicate or highly charged situation. Finn disliked silence, it called to light some innate unease which demanded avoidance, he found the emptiness unnerving and sought to fill it with music and conversation. It was a trait whose motives were unintelligible to the world at large, and maybe a habit even Finn himself was in the dark about, but Kurt possessed a certain aptitude for reading people, and when you shared your home and life with another soul twenty-four hours a day, you tended to notice the quirks and eccentricities in astronomical numeracy, and in idle hours unravel them.

This aspect of Finn's personality found many outlets; in the way that the music would crescendo when he thought he was home alone; in the way that he always found the direction of his feet leading him to Kurt's room upon the infrequent occasions they found themselves the men of the house, under the pretence of some feeble excuse which culminated in him taking up temporary residence; and in the way he always seemed to gravitate towards any gathering, never at the heart, but always infiltrating the front line.

Maybe his intolerance for silence was revelational of some great insecurity surrounding his fathers death and the absence left behind. Perhaps being raised by the tender and gentle hand of Carole, who had to compensate for the role of two parents in her sons life with a sense of omnipotence, had conditioned him to the necessity of company, knowing not how to be alone.

Maybe it was merely a simple quirk, which meant nothing so profound.

But, whatever its roots, Kurt cherished that insecurity, that humanizing agent which mean that the jock who had balanced the oppositional forces of football and Glee Club, still had fears and doubts. They were weaknesses and vulnerabilities which Kurt could shield him from, protect him in the same way Finn shot down any potential tyrant to Kurt's cause, usually earning himself some slights and insults for his trouble. It gave Kurt a purpose, made him feel like he was fulfilling the credentials of brotherhood in one respect at least.

For what it was worth, Kurt enjoyed the silence, because the void blurred the distinction between reality and imagination. He could envision scenarios which reality belied, and just for that one beautiful moment he could believe they were real.

That he could hear her humming gently, just like she always used to do. That when he laid upon his back in her room with the wardrobe doors thrown wide, eyes closed, smelling her, it was really her he was smelling, not just a remnant scent nurtured into endurance; an empty dream. That it was her hand which softly caressed his cheek, brushed against his forehead, her hand instead of the ghost of a wish; a desire which could never be satisfied.

"I think you had a very romanticised idea of senior year," Kurt chuckled slightly, even as Finn's eyes narrowed in mock indignation, "and few things are capable of living up to an ideal. Maybe you set yourself up for disappointment on that score." And then, with a frown and pensive tone, "but I also think that senior year is as good as you make it; and you can always choose to make it great, so maybe you're looking at it from the wrong perspective. If you only focus on the negative, then everything which is good fades in comparison until the only thing which is left to experience _is_ disappointment. It takes less strength to refuse moroseness than weakness to embrace it. So you had a rough week, things can only get better, right?"

And Kurt Hummel was the patron of second chance happiness; a testament to the phoenix rising from the ashes of one life and into the fire of another; surpassing even imaginations scope.

"Who would have thought, in the beginning, that the whole Karofsky situation would lead me to Blaine? Who _could_ have ever thought that hate and fear would lead ultimately to love? I certainly didn't! One of the greatest and most daunting features of life is; you never know what it has in store for you, just around the corner. So, stop expecting things to happen, and instead, make them."

Kurt smiled genially at his brother. If a career in musical theatre proved fruitless, he could always establish his own frank advice column. And who needed career guidance councillors anyway? Finn's incessant questions proved just at enlightening to Kurt and far less tedious. Finn was the Watson to his Sherlock; a muse to the thinker.

"Or that the words of an original song and loosing Nationals would actually win me Rachel's heart," Finn added with a fond laugh. Life was bizarre; a thing which at times seemed to make too much sense to be mere coincidence, and at others too little to be nothing more than a random series of events experienced by people of the moment.

"A prime example," Kurt agreed grinning at the memory of its resultant scandal.

Though he had been disappointed that Nationals had slipped from their grasp at the exact moment that it was tangible, secretly he was charmed by the whole hopeless romanticism of it all. And in the light of clarity and twelfth place, he and Mercedes had whiled away many hours animatedly gushing over the finer points of the performance which would stand forever as a testament of love between two people – one which the world at large would always fail to fully comprehend – and to the blank shock which was betrayed by the judges expressions. The New Directions performance would be forever considered with a 'never-in-all-my-days' incredulity.

"You know," said Kurt, raising an eyebrow, "for someone who snubs the greater majority of musicals, you're a total sucker for soppy scenarios." He laughed at Finn's playful outrage, before warning easily;

"don't even think about it," as he observed his brothers hand dart instinctively towards the disused pillow, a projectile whose mark Kurt possessed no doubt about.

Finn just stuck his tongue out instead, forcing Kurt into a state half way between amusement and disgust. And that gesture aptly surmised the childish climax their profound conversation had reached.

It was Kurt who re-established their topic after its flagrant digression, because the prospect of having to watch everybody go their own way was just as frightening and upsetting to him as to Finn, even more now that those insecurities had been dredged from their depths to meet the world.

Those people who, three years ago, he could not have cared less about now felt like a family, in the strongest sense of the term. They, each of them, meant something to him, and he knew that though it may recover, his heart would never be whole again when the time finally came to say goodbye to them, and know that those syllables were indefinitely permanent.

"Senior year isn't over yet. And we still have the potential to make it great. But sometimes it _is_ only memory which reveals the true value of the past, because the present invariably leaves us blinded to almost everything we have." It was said with a marked sadness and regret.

Finn nodded feigning understanding. The words in themselves sounded grand and momentous and they stirred something within him, even if what they actually said was meaningless.

"And yeah. In seven months time everything we've known will be gone, but isn't that even more motivation to make the memories now, while we still have the chance? Lets _make_ this year the greatest yet! Let's make it the one we all look back on and say; that was my year; that was the one, if I ever had the chance, I would live in forever; that was the one where I was happiest." Kurt's heart was wild with celebratory prospect, and a disconcerting sensation of monument simultaneously chilled and burned him like a fever.

"We're going to take Nationals this year," Finn vowed with an unshakable conviction. "We're bigger and better than ever before. This is New Directions year, I can feel it." He punched the air in exultation, already envisioning the victory won.

"We'll make it happen," Kurt promised. "You, me, Rachel and Blaine."

They didn't know how long it was before their ardent rapture faded into the peaceful and serene oblivion of slumber. The last thing Kurt was aware of was Finn snoring lightly, just to the right of the point where his feet timidly brushed the arm of the sofa and the even sounds soon pre-empted his own surrender.

* * *

It was a little past one in the morning when Burt and Carole returned home after a relatively successful stint of campaigning.

Seeing that the house was in darkness, they entered soundlessly. The cloying, pungent odour of take-out left to go cold greeted them in almost instantaneous welcome, arousing both of their parental instincts. Even from the vestibule they could hear the sounds of the television playing out a re-run of Les Mis.

With a small amount of trepidation, Carole entered the sitting room … only to have her heart melt and her breath stolen from her.

There, just perceptible in the flickering glare of the pixel screen, lay her two sons, crammed top and tail upon the sofa with practised symmetry. They appeared like a pair of mismatched twins, accustomed still to sharing and being comforted by proximity, even eighteen years free of the womb. It was moments such as these which made every strain of motherhood worth it.

She hushed Burt as he trudged wearily into the sitting room, bringing him to a halt in her half embrace, before whispering with an accompanying gesticulation;

"Look …"

With a tired mind, Burt observed the scene before his eyes; the mess of take-out wrappers that the boys knew better than to just leave festering and … oh. Burt Hummel actually felt a tear called to his eye to witness the tender scene before him, one that bespoke family better than any words could describe. Despite his tough exterior, he was a sentimentalist at heart. It was a trait that both of his boys exemplified.

"I guess some things never change, huh?" He knew not whether he was referring to the lax conduct of cleaning up after oneself, or the bond of brothers; as old as time, which he had the true privilege to witness for himself for the first time.

Carole smiled, moving forward softly to place a blanket over the two sleeping teens, before brushing a kiss upon each of their foreheads.

"Maybe some things never should," she whispered slipping her hand into Burt's.

The two moved like ghosts from the room, leaving their children to sleep on, and seeking their own respite. Through all the turbulent highs and lows, that one moment had presented itself as a sign.

It said; we made the right decision.

* * *

_Thank you very much for reading! :)_

_- One Wish Magic._


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